


95% Chance of Flirting

by NeurotropicAgentX



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human/Troll Society, Alternate Universe - No Sburb/Sgrub Sessions, Face Paint, M/M, Pale Romance | Moirallegiance, Rare Pair, Troll Fight Club, culture clash, minor bleeding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-24
Updated: 2016-08-24
Packaged: 2018-08-10 18:24:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,331
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7856233
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NeurotropicAgentX/pseuds/NeurotropicAgentX
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>‘That’s the fifth night in a row I’ve seen you in this workshop after human hours,’ a deep voice said. </p><p>Dirk’s shoulders tightened, but he didn’t think it would be noticeable to someone else. ‘Those are some mad observational skills you got there, bro. A little creepy maybe, but I’m not one to judge.’</p>
            </blockquote>





	95% Chance of Flirting

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Appleskin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Appleskin/gifts).



> Thank you for the cool rare-pair prompt! Hope this hits the notes you wanted.
> 
> Huge thank you to my beta.

It wasn’t like this was the only mixed troll/human university around, and it wasn’t like that was the main reason Dirk had enrolled. The National Institute of Programurder and Robotixtermination simply had the best robotics curriculum of any university in the country. The scholarship he’d been offered helped too, of course. 

Dirk was hanging back after his early night mechanical engineering class. Most of the other students filing out were trolls, and lots were covering yawns and grumbling about the early start. The huge blueblood that took the class refused to put his lectures online and claimed that 6pm starts were character building. That suited Dirk just fine.

‘Hey, professor, can I talk to you?’ Dirk asked, wandering to the front of the lecture theatre.

‘You may,’ said Professor Darkleer.

‘I was wondering if you would sign off on my application for after-human-hours access to the workshops. Administrangulation wants a senior professor to vouch for me and I thought you might be interested. You’ve seen my work and you know I respect the equipment.’

Darkleer gave Dirk a long look over the top of his glasses. ‘It is not about the proper use of the equipment, Mr Strider. I would be happy to sign your forms if that were the case. Campus administrangulation just prefers for our human students not to mingle too much with the troll student body.’

Dirk opened his mouth to protest, but Darkleer held up one massive hand to forestall him. ‘However,’ he continued, ‘I am aware of your reputation for taking more troll-taught classes than any other human student on campus. I believe you even go so far as to attend some of the morning tutorials.’

Dirk nodded. ‘Yes sir.’

‘And in all that time you’ve never been the centre of any… incidents. Please understand that your application also counts as a waiver, of sorts,’ said Darkleer.

Dirk had read over the fine print three times. He knew he was effectively agreeing to follow troll social mores at night. ‘I understand, professor.’ He shifted slightly to draw attention to the katana hilt poking over his shoulder.

Darkleer sighed and pushed his glasses back against his face. ‘Yes, I suppose you do. Hand your forms over and I’ll sign. We all expect great work from you, Mr Strider. Your horsework speaks for itself.’

Dirk kept his face impassive. ‘I intend to use what the tackulty sees fit to provide.’ Darkleer’s stern expression softened into the barest hint of a smile. He was absolutely Dirk’s favourite professor. 

///

‘That’s the fifth night in a row I’ve seen you in this workshop after human hours,’ a deep voice said. 

Dirk’s shoulders tightened, but he didn’t think it would be noticeable to someone else. He didn’t look up from his work. ‘Those are some mad observational skills you got there, bro. A little creepy maybe, but I’m not one to judge.’ 

There was a long beat of silence. ‘Are you fetching to go motherfucking nocturnal? Can mess a human up, apparently.’

‘Am I in your way, or something?’ Dirk asked, trying to decide if that was supposed to be a threat. He finally looked up from his work and then kept looking up. If the subtle rattling growl underlying the words hadn’t been enough of a clue, the inhumanly deep voice would have been. This troll was bigger than most he’d seen around campus. The subtle touches of violet in the outfit were enough to project highblood, or at least someone playing at it. The skull-and-bones motif, along with the face paint and clothes also suggested some kind of goth/clown/juggalo hybrid, if the signifiers meant the same thing to trolls.

‘Nothing like that,’ the troll replied. He remained standing just outside the door to the lab, which was good. ‘Thought you could maybe get some sleep, is all,’ continued the huge-ass troll.

Dirk quirked an eyebrow up above the line of his shades. ‘…okay, thank you for your concern, citizen. I think you just filled your good deed quota for the night, but unfortunately I’m all out of receipts.’ Dirk mimed searching his pockets and gave an expansive shrug when he came up empty-handed.

The troll snorted. ‘Well shit, I wasn’t looking to exceed no quota, but...’ He made a rattling sound in his throat. ‘That is, you could maybe eat something.’

With that, he took something out of his sylladex and put it on the bench by the door. He left without saying another word.

Well that was a completely normal and explicable thing that had just happened. Maybe he’d been the victim of some horrible cross-species outreach program. Dirk frowned and went back to soldering.

It took a full twenty minutes for the curiosity to get to him. Well, it took ten minutes, but stubbornness made him hold out for longer. He had shit to do that didn’t involve mysterious offerings from creepy goth-clown trolls. Dirk put his tools aside and went over to the bench. There was an apple sitting on it, covered in the lurid packaging of the Healthy Food Initiative™ vending machines. The smiling anthropomorphic fruits printed on the plastic were just this side of uncanny valley.

He picked it up, went over to a free bench and filled a bucket with water from the sink. He placed the packet in the water and pushed it down until it was fully submerged. There were no leaks. Dirk took it out and turned it around in his hands. Okay, point in favour of it being an outreach program and not a _hilarious_ prank. 

Having been reminded, Dirk realised he was kind of hungry. He’d last eaten… at lunch? Dinner? He pulled open the packet and started eating the apple one-handed as he went back to his work. This one definitely made the list of top ten weirdest things to happen to him while on campus.

///

It was half a week before mystery-troll came back to the workshop. The thing was, Dirk _knew_ he had a weakness for puzzles. Mystery-troll was the most interesting thing that’d happened in months and Dirk had definitely annoyed his friends by endlessly rehashing the details with them. He’d started reading up on troll behaviours in his limited free time too. It wasn’t being obsessive, it was being prepared. If he was going to get jumped, he wanted to know it.

‘Hey,’ mystery-troll said. The deep harmonics in his voice made Dirk itch for sound equipment to take a sample.

‘Well, look who’s back,’ Dirk said. ‘Do you come bearing the cornucopia of cross-species friendship again?’ He straightened up from the workbench and wandered over as casually as he could. He stayed out of reach of those long arms, though. 

Mystery-troll gave this enigmatic little grin. It was kind of cute, in a creepy sort of way. ‘Got something better than that.’

‘I wouldn’t mind getting a name for my anonymous benefactor,’ Dirk said.

‘Will I be getting yours?’

‘I asked first, bro.’

The grin widened. ‘Kurloz Makara.’

‘Dirk Strider. Are you some kind of student rep?’

‘No.’ Kurloz took out a business card of some sort and laid it on the bench beside them. He slid it forward with two fingers and then leaned back slightly. Guy might have some personal space issues. Dirk picked up the card, keeping an eye on Kurloz. 

It was stamped with troll script. Dirk was better at the written form than the spoken, but he couldn’t _quite_ parse it. 

‘Troll fight club?’ he asked.

‘Recreational sparring,’ Kurloz corrected with a shrug. ‘A lot of highbloods show, but lowbloods too, and a handful of humans get to coming. Looks like you could maybe use an outlet.’ His gaze slid away as he said the last sentence and only then did Dirk realise that they’d been staring at each other pretty intensely for the last few moments.

Dirk slipped the card into a pocket to give himself something to do. ‘An outlet?’ he asked, allowing the barest hint of an upward inflection to colour his tone.

‘Yeah,’ Kurloz continued, ‘you’re a pretty tense motherfucker.’ He was still looking anywhere but at Dirk while he spoke. 

There were of course a hundred ways he could be reading this wrong, but Dirk was nearly eighty percent sure he was being flirted at. ‘Will you be there?’ he asked, testing the waters.

Kurloz looked back at him again and lifted the corner of one lip, displaying a hint of fang. ‘Yeah, if I don’t get a chance at locking horns regular, things can get a bit… ugly, if you up and know what I mean.’

Dirk did not. But it had gone up to a ninety-five percent chance of flirting, despite the cues that made zero sense to him. ‘I’ll be there.’

‘Good. Midnight tomorrow, room 302 in the student centre.’ Kurloz hesitated. ‘And you should get some sleep before then,’ he added in a rush.

Dirk raised an eyebrow. ‘Okay then. I’ll see you around.’

///

When Dirk turned up to troll fight club he was doubly armed. Obviously he’d brought his katana (and more weapons in his specibus), but he was now also armed with the near-certain knowledge that Kurloz had been pale-flirting with him. The food and comments about his sleep were pretty unambiguous, but he’d stumbled over the whole ‘tense and dangerous’ vibes Kurloz had been trying to give off. Eventually one site had explained that it was a common highblood tactic to invite pacification by appearing unstable.

But Kurloz had commented on how tense _Dirk_ had looked and suggested an outlet. Unless the invitation was a roundabout way of showing how dangerous Kurloz was? According to about half the sites Dirk had looked at, Kurloz was supposed to be looking for a calm lowblood to soothe him, and as much as Dirk was peripherally aware of humans’ reputation as soft pale-bait, he was pretty sure he was one of the last humans to fit that description. 

What even was the hemospectrum binary? Did two tightly wound highbloods ever pap it out together? According to some sites, yes, though Dirk had enough… experience to recognise fetish sites, even cross-culturally. Even in a quadrant involving no sex.

Eventually, after hours of agonising and introspection, Dirk had decided that he wouldn’t mind pursuing a pale relationship. Almost all the sites he’d seen, barring a couple of fluffly-looking PSA-style edu-sites, seemed to think that humans just didn’t get it and the whole thing was way too nuanced and complex for puny mammalian brains. Well, challenge accepted. Dirk was certain he’d be able navigate the pale quadrant, mammal or not.

These thoughts and more ran around Dirk’s mind as he climbed the final flight of stairs to room 302. It would be good to swing a sword for an hour or two. He hadn’t gotten a chance to spar since he’d started studying at the university and he missed the way it blanked his mind beyond anything but his opponent. 

When he entered the room, Dirk took stock of the others. There were a lot of trolls and most of them were wearing face paint similar to Kurloz’s. There were a few humans, though most of them looked like gym-junkies. Dirk spotted Kurloz standing in one corner. His arms were crossed against his chest and he watched the room with a vaguely proprietary eye. 

Dirk went over to him. ‘Quite a turn out.’

Kurloz’s gaze darted over to him and then back to the rest of the room. ‘Always is.’

‘So, should I have worn face paint to fit in?’ Dirk asked after a long moment of silence.

Kurloz went very still. ‘No you should motherfucking not,’ he said, very low and quiet. Something in the undertones made the hair on Dirk’s arms stand up. He supressed a shiver. 

‘Chill, dude.’

The strange oppressive feel in the air cleared and Kurloz shot Dirk a wide-eyed look. 

Right, the pale thing, shit. First Dirk had offended Kurloz about the face paint, and then he’d practically soothed him in fucking public. That must have been a new land-speed record for fucking up a first date, closely followed by every other attempt Dirk had ever made at a relationship. 

Keeping his expression locked down, Dirk lifted one shoulder. ‘Sorry man, my bad. Should I maybe call it a night and let you get on with things?’

Kurloz unfolded his arms and turned to face Dirk front-on in one smooth movement. Dude was fast, maybe flash-step fast. ‘No! You should stay. If you want to. I won’t be going off like that again.’

Dirk wondered if he should say something about how the response didn’t seem particularly like ‘going off’ or if that would look like he was down-playing Kurloz’s potential as pap-bait. He settled for a neutral reply. ‘Cool.’ 

The groups of trolls and humans were dispersing and forming a loose circle around the edges of the room. ‘Is the first rule of troll fight club not to talk about troll fight club?’

Kurloz snorted. ‘Not many rules here. The ones as want to fight do, and no interference from any others. Things stay friendly.’

Dirk nodded. A couple of face-painted trolls got into the centre of the circle and pulled their weapons. One had a pair of knives, the other a spiky flail. Dirk raised an eyebrow as they charged at each other. Their horns cracked together, but neither of them were bringing weapons into play just yet. They drew apart and the one with knives swiped out.

Kurloz was wearing a strange half-smile as he watched the bout. There was a lot of dodging and blocking and the whole thing was a lot less bloody than Dirk had expected. Trolls healed fast, a lot faster than humans, but they seemed to be being pretty careful. Eventually the troll with the flail managed to clip the arm of the knife-wielding one. They broke apart, sweating and panting, a faint violet flush visible at the edges of their paint-jobs. They melted back into the crowd just as a troll and a human stepped forward. 

‘So it’s to first blood?’ Dirk asked.

‘Yes. No one’s to get their rampages or pitch displays on. Just something to take the edge off.’

The cross-species pair didn’t do the horn-charge, but their weapons looked just as live and wicked-sharp as the ones the troll pair had wielded. As Dirk watched he tried to work out what Kurloz wanted here. Would they fight each other? Was that pale? Did Kurloz intend to show off how dangerous he was? Was this genuinely a bid to try and calm _him_ down with a friendly soothing bout? Dirk _hated_ the uncertainty. 

He was saved from devolving further into his thoughts by a sea troll who sauntered up to Kurloz.

‘Church-clown, care to join me in the ring?’

Kurloz looked at the sea troll. ‘Plenty of Church brothers here, fish-face. Why’re your gander bulbs set on me?’

‘Plenty of church-clowns, but none of them are Makaras. You’ve got yourself a bit of a reputation.’

Dirk followed the sense of the conversation, if not the details. Maybe this _was_ about Kurloz showing off how dangerous he was.

Kurloz laughed, soft and nasty. ‘You want to tangle with my reputation, motherfucking bring it.’

Sea troll smirked. ‘Remember the rules. No powers, so no Chucklevoodoos and no flash-stepping.’

‘Do not lecture a brother on his own motherfucking rules, fish-face. No ranged weapons, neither.’

The sea troll inclined his head, which Dirk realised was probably more about showing the horns than nodding.

Kurloz gave a strange growl. ‘And no pitch,’ he added in response.

The sea troll sniffed. ‘As if I’d lower myself.’

They strode into the ring and Kurloz drew a huge spiked club from his specibus. Sea troll eyed it and produced his own bladed monstrosity. It was an asterisk of blades, held a bit like a shield and not quite like any human weapon Dirk had ever encountered. 

The pair of them charged, locking horns and holding it for longer than the first pair of combatants had. When they drew apart, they gave each other enough space to bring their weapons up. Then Kurloz lashed out with his club, using his superior reach to try and get at the sea troll. Sea troll caught the strike on his weird blade-shield and twisted it in a disarming move. 

Dirk raised an eyebrow at the way the muscles in Kurloz’s arm strained against the output of force. Those were definitely not human tendon connections there. He tried not to stare to obviously. Kurloz pulled back suddenly, ducking the recoil from the sea troll’s weapon and struck again. The sea troll pivoted and leaned back, just out of range the club’s spikes. 

Sea troll’s growl had changed enough that even Dirk could detect the new undertones. He had no idea what it was meant to communicate, but a bunch of the trolls in the audience looked uncomfortable and Kurloz’s face had gone eerily blank. It was less poker-face and more… worrying. Dirk itched to fix it somehow before stamping down hard on the instinct. He knew his ideas about fixing people only led to drama and alienating his friends. He _knew_ that. It did not work the same way as fixing a faulty circuit connection on a robot. Unfortunately. 

Sea troll lashed out again. His expression was caught between a snarl and a grin and Kurloz just managed to sidestep the sweep of the blades. Kurloz’s club skittered off the edge of the sea troll’s weapon and he tried to swing down to graze his opponent’s leg. The sea troll leapt back and then ducked toward the inside Kurloz’s swing. The blade-shield slashed up and across in a vicious sweep. The sea troll was inside Kurloz’s reach and there was no way to deflect the strike. The blade shield sliced a line across Kurloz’s jaw and halfway up his cheek. Bright violet blood welled up from the cut.

Both trolls stepped back to disengage. There was a mingling of boos and cheers from the audience. Most of the face-painted trolls were scowling. One of them called out ‘No pitch!’ but was hushed by the troll standing next to them.

Kurloz was staring narrow-eyed at his opponent. The sea troll’s grin had widened, displaying a row of needle-like teeth. 

‘Nice fight,’ he said, tossing his horns. There was an indrawn breath, though Dirk wasn’t quite sure what the gesture was supposed to mean. 

Kurloz’s lips peeled back from his fangs, but he managed to return the platitude from between his clenched teeth. 

The sea troll drew a purple handkerchief from his sylladex and threw it down in front of Kurloz. ‘Looks like you’ve got a smudge there. Might as well wipe the whole thing off, don’t you think?’ he said.

A couple of the painted trolls gasped. Kurloz went completely still and the air in the room filled with a heavy oppressive feeling. Deep atavistic dread curled around Dirk’s mind and weird half-sensations ran down his spine. It took him a moment to recognise it as a stronger version of whatever had happened when he’d accidently riled Kurloz about the face paint.

It took him another half-second to put it together and realise that this was what Kurloz had meant by ‘going off’. This was just another manifestation of troll psychic powers, like the telekinetic in Dirk’s programurder elective. The knowledge helped and Dirk was able to compartmentalise the fear into something halfway workable. He could actually move now, which was a vast improvement on being completely paralysed. The other trolls seemed to be taking it worse and most of them were staring at Kurloz with varying degrees of horror. 

‘Kurloz bro,’ Dirk called, taking a step forward. Kurloz whipped around to focus on the movement. His eyes seemed redder than usual. ‘You maybe want to chill? You said something about not “going off” earlier. I wouldn’t exactly call this being on.’

The tiniest hint of tension left Kurloz’s shoulders and his club dipped maybe a hair. Holy shit, this was actually working. Dirk licked his suddenly dry lips. ‘Don’t make me pacify you. I may be human, but this is a first date, and I’m not easy.’

Kurloz took a deep breath and seemed to rein himself in. He returned his club to his specibus and the fear miasma dissipated. ‘Wouldn’t put that on you,’ Kurloz muttered. ‘Sorry, bro.’ He wasn’t meeting Dirk’s eyes, or anyone else’s for that matter.

Fish troll put away his weapon and edged toward the door. He looked a little green around the gills. No one tried to get in his way. A couple of the face-painted trolls were side-eying Kurloz and Dirk realised he was getting his fair share of looks too. One of them made a quick diamond gesture at him and winked. Dirk kept his expression bland.

Kurloz made that rattling sound in his throat that Dirk was beginning to pick up as a signifier of uncertainty. ‘Gonna head back to the institutional sleep hive. Get my homework on.’

Dirk weighed up his options. ‘Getting a bit late for humans. I’m done too.’

Kurloz flashed him a quick look before glancing away again. ‘Don’t have to do that, if you don’t want. Didn’t even get your fight on yet,’ he said.

Dirk shrugged. ‘Not a problem. I’ll strife it out next time.’

That enigmatic little smile made its way back to Kurloz’s face. ‘Yeah, next time.’

Dirk tucked his hands into his pockets and followed Kurloz out the door. He ignored the whispers he left in his wake. Who knew trolls were such gossips? 

Kurloz and Dirk were quiet for most of the trip, up until they had to go left or right, either to the human or troll dorms. 

‘Come to my room,’ Dirk blurted. ‘I’ve got a first-aid kit to help deal with the cut.’ His expression was perfectly controlled, but he felt heat rising to his cheeks. Treating wounds was definitely a pale thing, but there was no reason for _Dirk_ to be getting flustered over this. It wasn’t like _he_ came from a culture that gave something as simple as first-aid romantic connotations. 

He totally did. He’d watched enough of Jake’s shitty action-adventure movies to know that much.

Kurloz swallowed. ‘You wanting to put your hands on my face, huh?’

Dirk went cold. ‘Just to deal with the blood. I wouldn’t touch your paint or anything,’ he hastened to add. Fuck! He knew that was a touchy subject for Kurloz and now he’d managed to blunder into it twice in one night. It should not be possible to fuck something up this much. But that was him, Dirk Strider: master of the impossible.

‘Chill bro,’ Kurloz said with a half-smile. ‘I got my knowing on of what you’re offering. Just making sure you do.’

Dirk nodded slowly, deeply relieved. ‘I know what I’m offering.’

They went down the left hallway past the endless doors splitting off the hall and into single rooms. That was one huge advantage of a mostly troll college. There were no doubles because apparently trolls got touchy about territory. Dirk could certainly appreciate the mentality.

They came to Dirk’s room and he unlocked the door and went inside. He could feel Kurloz’s presence at his back. ‘Make yourself at home. Take the seat or the bed. I promise the latter’s just a human recupercoon equivalent.’

Kurloz sat a little stiffly on the room’s single chair. Dirk went into the bathroom to retrieve his kit and a damp face-towel to help mop up the blood. That was another nice thing about the rooms in a troll-designed college – everyone got their own bathroom to wash sopor slime off in the mornings. 

Kurloz was tall enough that having him sitting put him at the right height for tending to his face. Dirk put the kit down on the desk and stood awkwardly in front of Kurloz, holding the face cloth. Dirk swallowed. ‘So, should I just… get the blood off your jaw? I’ll be careful of the paint.’

‘Yeah, go ahead,’ Kurloz said. He stared at Dirk for a moment and then closed his eyes.

Dirk’s breath caught. He knew how much trust that took for a troll, even if the other person in the room was a human. He reached out and gently took a hold of Kurloz’s chin. His fingers may have stroked the jawline, just a bit. Kurloz uttered a breathy kind of hiss. Dirk froze. Kurloz’s eyes didn’t open. It was probably a good hiss, then.

Dirk started very carefully blotting at the blood. It was almost dried and kind of tacky against Kurloz’s tough grey skin. He worked slowly and methodically, avoiding smearing the face paint as much as possible and trying not to irritate the wound. It was nice to be able to help with something as straightforward as minor first aid. 

Once he’d wiped away all the blood he inspected the cut. Dirk nearly jumped when Kurloz opened his eyes and broke the deep silence. ‘Wasn’t quite what I had in mind this night,’ he said.

Dirk raised an eyebrow. ‘Oh?’

‘Yeah, was looking to sooth away some of your bloodlust at recreational sparring and then maybe treat any scratch as _you_ might have picked up. Or at least see you a little less wound up. This seduction’s going opposite ways.’

Dirk gave a small smile. ‘Dude, I’m not bloodthirsty. Humans aren’t known for their tendency to rampage.’

‘You telling me strifing wouldn’t help you get your relax on?’ Kurloz asked shrewdly. 

Dirk shrugged. ‘Maybe a bit. But…’ he hesitated. Pale was about trust, right? Kurloz had just laid out some honesty and it was only fair for Dirk to lay out his own honest truths for perusal. He swallowed. ‘Let’s just say that I’m pretty chill in a crisis. Helping someone out in a danger situation is usually hard to fuck up.’

Kurloz expression was all raised-eyebrows surprise. He licked his lips. ‘Maybe something to do with a motherfucker being in control? Pretty easy to help someone _else_ out?’

Dirk looked away. ‘Yeah, something like that.’

Kurloz held his hands up. ‘Not looking to push on a – on a first date, just wondering.’

Dirk nodded. ‘No it’s fine. I just. Don’t really do this sort of thing.’ He made a flicking hand gesture to encompass the room and both of them.

‘It shows,’ Kurloz said. ‘Easy to get tense with no one to jam with.’

Dirk blinked. ‘I’ll take your word for it. Would you like me to put something on the cut? It looks pretty good, and I know you guys heal fast, but the kit came with some troll antiseptic that I haven’t even cracked the seal on.’

Kurloz made the breathy hissing sound again. ‘Think I’d like that. But…’ He looked down to one side. ‘Thinking maybe the holy paint gets in the way of that a bit.’

A strange feeling rose in Dirk and he didn’t even try to catch Kurloz’s eyes. He tried to respond, but his throat was suddenly dry and his heartbeat was going double-time. A real sub-divided rhythm. He didn’t do anything trite like ask if Kurloz was sure. No, the only thing to do in a situation like this was escalate. Dirk took off his shades and hooked them on the collar of his shirt.

Kurloz looked him in the eyes for a long, uncomfortable, staring moment. Dirk didn’t turn his face away, but his gaze shifted just far enough that he was looking at Kurloz’s nose instead. ‘You wouldn’t do that for just any motherfucker, would you?’ Kurloz asked quietly.

Dirk shrugged, still not meeting that searching gaze. ‘I won’t pretend that I grok all the connotations of your paint, but I get that a bare face can matter. A lot.’ 

Kurloz stopped his intense staring after another moment and tilted his head up. His horns were pointing away and the exposed line of his throat was _right there_. Dirk tried to remember if he’d ever seen a troll tip their head back that far outside of horn tosses or deferential displays to faculty. 

‘Cool,’ said Dirk breathlessly, in the absence of anything useful to say. He brought the cloth up to Kurloz’s face and gently wiped the paint away from the unmarred cheek. When Kurloz gave no indication to stop, Dirk got a little bolder. He ran the cloth over Kurloz’s brow and chin, at first just smearing the paint and then clearing it away completely. The work was kind of soothing of itself and Dirk found himself staring, trying to capture each subtle movement of Kurloz’s face.

On impulse, Dirk ran his fingertips lightly up the line of Kurloz’s throat. Kurloz shuddered beneath his touch and gave a soft hiss, barely distinguishable from a long exhalation. Then Dirk used the last clean edge of the cloth to ever-so-gently clear the paint surrounding the cut. He picked up the tube of troll antiseptic and then just kind of stood there. 

Kurloz’s face looked a lot softer without the paint and about thirty times less creepy. Some of what Dirk had assumed were hollows generated by the white-on-grey paint were in fact the actual contours of Kuroz’s face. Maybe Dirk wasn’t the only one to occasionally skip meals. Or was that just how some troll faces looked?

With a jolt, Dirk realised that Kurloz’s eyes had opened and were scrutinising him back with at least as much interest. Dirk felt a brief, fierce pang where he wanted to put his shades on or turn away, but instead he held that piercing gaze. It was Kurloz who broke the silence. ‘Like what you see, bro?’

The line brought a twitch of a smile to Dirk’s face. Some things were universal. Like bad pick-up lines. ‘Yeah, I do,’ Dirk said, too sincerely.

Kurloz reached out toward Dirk’s face with one hand, but faltered at the last moment. ‘Can I?’ he asked quietly.

Dirk swallowed. ‘Sure.’

Kurloz’s fingers were cool against his face. He swept them down one of Dirk’s cheeks and then down the bridge of his nose. Dirk’s eyes fluttered shut and Kurloz brushed across his brow and eyelid. He’d never noticed how long and graceful Kurloz’s fingers were. There was a weird combination of nerves and contentment in Dirk, but each pass of Kurloz’s fingers settled the tense edges until Dirk’s shoulders un-hunched and his breathing evened out. 

Kurloz drew back, watching Dirk with that inscrutable little smile. Dirk blinked slowly and his thoughts responded like something languid. He blinked again. He was still holding the antiseptic. ‘Want me to treat that cut?’ he asked. It had already sealed, though it looked completely different to the way a human wound clotted.

Kurloz shrugged, his eyes were half-lidded and his smile looked oddly knowing at this angle. ‘Probably all that needs doing for tonight’s been done.’

Dirk nodded. 

Kurloz stood, stretching in a subtlety non-human movement. ‘Got my paints in my sylladex. There a mirror I could get to using?’

Dirk cleared his throat. ‘There’s one in the bathroom.’

Kurloz padded into the bathroom and closed the door. He was gone for several minutes. Dirk tried to work out what to do with himself and failed to think of anything. Then Kurloz appeared with a fresh coat of face paint. It looked more precise than usual, the edges clean and sharp. Kurloz came to stand in front of Dirk. He gave a rattling growl. ‘Next recreational sparring’s a week from now,’ he said.

‘I’ll be there.’

Kurloz smiled and held out his hand. Dirk went in for the handshake, but Kurloz deftly turned his hand and brought Dirk’s fingertips to his lips. The kiss was brief and dry. For some inexplicable reason Dirk’s heart pounded like rom-com protagonist’s.

‘Looking motherfucking forward to it,’ Kurloz said.


End file.
